Theology in the Raw - 772: #772 - The Annihilation View of Hell Part 1

Episode Date: December 30, 2019

Preston explains his journey with the doctrine of hell, from thinking that annihilation was heresy and that John Stott must have lost his faith for believing it, to writing Erasing Hell and still leaning toward the traditional view, to continuing to rethink the biblical legitimacy of the annihilation view. Support Preston Support Preston by going to patreon.com Connect with Preston Twitter | @PrestonSprinkle Instagram | @preston.sprinkle Check out his website prestonsprinkle.com If you enjoy the podcast, be sure to leave a review.

Hello, Theology in the Raw listeners, a very Merry Christmas to you and a forthcoming Happy New Year. So let's talk about hell. I hesitated whether I should release this episode now, right between Christmas and New Year, but it actually fit in perfect with the schedule. And I know that no matter what time of the year it is, the topic of hell is something that Christians and non-Christians alike often do think about. So I thought to myself, I said, self, I don't think there is a good time to talk about hell or even a bad time to talk about hell. Hell is something that is on people's minds. So let's go ahead and talk about it. Now I have sat on this episode for a long time, almost a year. This episode is, was, well, I originally recorded this episode as part of my Patreon-only podcast.

So as most of you know, I am supported on Patreon, or actually, you, some of you are supporting me on Patreon. or actually you, some of you are supporting me on Patreon. And in return for those, for the support that people give, I release monthly podcasts, monthly blog posts. And every now and then I will ask my Patreon supporters, hey, would you mind if I released this premium content, this podcast that's behind a paywall? Would you mind if I release this to the general public? And every time I ask, they're always like,

dude, yes, absolutely. You don't need to ask us. We support you not to get stuff in return, but because we believe in your ministry. So that's what happened almost a year ago. I recorded a two-part series on the question of hell, specifically the question of the nature of hell. Specifically, even more specifically, annihilation versus eternal conscious torment or ECT. And both of those different views presuppose the idea that there is a place called hell. That is a, even place might be a little too specific, but there is a hell and it is a place of judgment. It is where people go who deny Jesus, don't accept Jesus, don't have faith in Christ, who reject God, whatever phrase you want to use, that there is a hell that those people go to. Now, the question is what happens when they go there? Do they suffer forever and ever and ever in an, in a, in a conscious state of torment? That's ECT, eternal conscious torment, or do they simply die? Um, And that would be like,

they, you know, their, their life ends when they go to hell. And that latter view is, was often referred to as annihilation view of hell, which I don't love the phrase annihilation. I will continue to use it.

It's the popular phrase, but some people think annihilation, Oh, poof, you know, no material remains or whatever. Like, like there's no more, whatever, poof, you know, no material remains or whatever. Like there's no more whatever, no more atoms in existence or whatever. And I think that just kind of, I don't know, just kind of frames the whole question in a weird way.

So but that is a popular phrase. Annihilation refers to the view that when people go to hell, their life ceases. There is no longer any conscious existence, no longer like any ongoing sort of torment. The phrase that most quote unquote annihilators prefer is conditional immortality, that our immortality is contingent upon believing in Jesus so that if you don't believe in Jesus, you don't have immortality. Your being doesn't exist forever and ever and ever. And then there's a few other phrases that some people prefer as well. But anyway, those are the two views. Now, almost a year ago, I released a two-part podcast series

for my Patreon supporters, and it was laying out why I hold to the annihilation of hell. Now, here's why I, well, several reasons, but the main reason why I hesitated releasing this podcast is because I know this doctrine is incredibly sensitive. I know that some of you even now hearing that I'm going to argue for the annihilation of hell might be freaking out. I thought Preston was a Christian. And actually in this podcast, you'll hear how I used to have that very same mindset. So I know exactly what you're thinking. Those of you out there who are just bewildered that I would even hold to this view, I hesitate dropping a bomb in

people's laps. Now, a lot of you already know I hold this view. It's not like I haven't been secret about it. I just haven't gone out of my way to kind of like, you know, blog about it or podcast about it at least for a long time. So, so I hesitated. I really do. Cause I, I meet people all the time. I've got several of your names and faces right now, just going through my mind. And I'm like, oh my gosh, this person's going to listen to this and that person, that pastor and that friend. And I don't, we haven't talked about this and I don't know, is this going to, how are they going to feel? How are they going to receive this? When I start talking about the annihilation of hell, a lot of people have just so many presuppositions about what this means for somebody's faith, somebody's biblical commitment and orthodoxy

and so on. So I hesitated. I literally sat on this for eight months. I literally sat on it, but I didn't release it for eight months because I was like, I don't know, do I want to go public with this? But I figured, hey, it's the holiday season. Everybody's trying to be kind. So yeah, everybody might be in a better place to receive this. So here is the first part of the two-part series on the annihilation of hell. This first part gives a lot of backstory, a lot of personal backstory about writing the book Erasing Hell, about my journey in this conversation, how I used to think through it. And I do get into the text to some extent, wrestling with various phrases like eternal

fire or the weeping and gnashing of teeth and a few other phrases that some people take immediately to be clear evidence of the eternal conscious torment view of hell. And so I do, I do dig into that, but most of this podcast is, is, is just personal. It just is a personal backstory on how I wrestled with his doctrine in the next podcast, which I will release next week at the beginning of the year, I do a thorough sweep of the biblical text and the Jewish context of the New Testament. As I say in this podcast, it is, well, the last half of this podcast and the entire next podcast are going to be pretty academic, pretty deep. And so,

yeah, some of you will appreciate it. Some of you might be stretched beyond what you want to be stretched. But either way, I think this doctrine warrants a lot of deep thinking and exegesis interpretation of the text. So I make no apologies for going deep because especially for people who might be like, no way, there's no way this is even possibly a biblical doctrine. Then all the more reason to go really deep into the text to see whether or not it has biblical merit. Okay. So just one more quick thing. I tried to edit this podcast a little bit from the original, but you'll still hear references kind of maybe throughout to my Patreon supporters or thanks for supporting me or this, that, or, you know, I just, yeah, it would be too, it would just chop it up too much if I went through and edited all of that out. So you are

sort of listening into a conversation that I'm having with my Patreon supporters. And as always, yes, of course, if you want to support the show and get access to, well, premium content, like what you're about to listen to, this one's for free, but there's loads of other stuff that is still behind the paywall. You can go to patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw, support the show for as little as five bucks a month, and you would support the ministry and get access to more content. So without further ado, here is my eight month old podcast on the annihilation of evil. For this show, I'm going to do something a little risky. And I went back and forth on whether I should do this. Because on the one hand, some of you may be incredibly interested in what I'm going to do in this podcast.

And others may be bored to tears. I hope you won't be bored to tears. I really don't want to waste your time and money on a boring Patreon-only podcast. I mean, these are supposed to be like, you know, Oh my gosh, I am so glad I get this podcast. It's worth the $25 a month gift to, uh, the old general. And I, and I hope that's your response to this. Um, but I understand that some of you may not be into understanding the doctrine of hell, which is what this podcast is all about.

And also this podcast is going to be pretty academically rigorous. It's going to be intellectually pretty, I guess, challenging because I think that if I am going to advocate for the annihilation view of hell, I want to make sure that I have all my ducks in a row, have all my exegesis or interpretations of various passages in order. I want to make sure I've done the work. If I'm going to advocate for a view that some people say is heretical and that I'm not even a Christian anymore and that I've denied Jesus and the gospel and I'm damned to hell for disagreeing with the doctrine of hell or whatever. So it's because of the severity and intensity of this doctrine that I want to make sure I have, that I've done the research and thinking that I need to have done to embrace something like the annihilation of hell. So that's what I'm going to do in this podcast.

I hope, I'm going to try to get, I'm going to try to not be too long. I mean, I just, I read through my notes and I've got, I mean, I literally have 27 pages of notes and nine, I'm looking at my word document right here. Now over 9,000 words that I've written here. And then this is based on a talk I gave a, gave a year ago at the Erasing Hell conference. So I don't know if anybody out there, if any of you were there, but this, my, my podcast is going to be similar to my talk that I gave a year ago at the Erasing Hell annual conference in, in Dallas, Texas. Um, so I have a ton of information here and I want to, I want to go somewhat smoothly and somewhat quickly so that this doesn't become like, I don't want this to

be more than like 40 minutes. I would love this podcast to be like 30 minutes so I can see, can I convey what my view in 30 minutes or less? So with that, I'm already three minutes into the podcast. Let me jump in and start talking about why I would hold to the annihilation view of hell. Let me give you a bit of background to start out. When I was in seminary in the early 2000s, and I remember hearing that John Stott, who is a major towering evangelical figure in the late 20th century, major. I mean, this is like the John Piper, John MacArthur of the UK, John Stott. I mean, scholar, pastor, writer, speaker. I mean, the guy's amazing.

A stalwart. Do we use that term anymore? Stalwart of evangelicalism. And it came out that he holds student annihilation of hell. And I remember thinking in seminary when I heard that, I'm like, oh my gosh, is he even a Christian? I thought John Stott was a Christian. How's he not a Christian? Look at all the amazing Christian things he's done and books he's written on the Bible. And did he lose his salvation? Well, I don't believe you can lose your salvation. So

I guess he wasn't a Christian all along, but man, how can you write such amazing stuff for all these years and live, I mean, an amazing godly life and not be a Christian? So this is kind of the turmoil I went through, which hopefully you're kind of chuckling, like, dude, you're working with like weird categories of like, is he a Christian or not? Like, does that mean he's not a Christian because he changed his view on hell? I mean, does he have biblical reasons for it? Like, I didn't even ask that question. To me, annihilation was by definition not biblical and heretical so that I didn't even think about. I mean, this is so sad.

Like, John Stott has been nothing but just a biblically addicted preacher. Like this guy is just so biblical. And yet when it came out that he was an annihilationist, I didn't even think about asking the question. Huh? He's insanely biblical. I wonder what biblical evidence he has for this view. Didn't even think about that. Didn't even entertain that as a question that I should ask,

like what biblical evidence does he have for this view? I just, it just wasn't even a conversation in my own heart. It was, he's not a Christian anymore, or maybe he was never a Christian, or it was more like, did he lose his salvation? Was he just never saved to begin with? That was kind of where my heart went. It was just the, but my response to John Stott was fueled by the assumption that you can't be a Christian and an annihilationist. Okay. Fast forward 10 years, 2011, Rob Bell publishes his book, Love Wins, and, you know, arguing, well, arguing, he doesn't say he's arguing for it, but he is arguing for it. And, you know, arguing, well, arguing, he doesn't say he's arguing for it, but he is arguing for it.

Christian universalism. And I love the book, actually. When I read it, I was like, oh my gosh, there's so much good stuff here. I wasn't really, I don't know if I was allowed to say that when I read it. I was like, oh man, this is really good. I actually like a lot of what he's saying. But when it came to his understanding of hell, here's where the whole thing began. When I read his understanding of hell, I didn't even, at this point, I didn't even say like, oh, that's wrong. My first response was that's very un-Jewish. And if you know anything about Rod Bell, you know, he's a huge fan of like first century Judaism. Like he's all about the Jewish background. And I remember reading Love Wins and saying, okay, I don't think he's right about hell, but I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt. And at that point, I'd, you know, I'd be, you know, developed a much more gracious and understanding posture in terms of,

you know, hot button issues. But I, you know, when I read his argument, I was like, Rob, Rob, Rob, Rob, Rob. I'm not sure if you're right or not, but what I do know for sure is that you are very un-Jewish because I know the Jewish literature really well. In fact, I knew the Jewish literature on the doctrine of hell better than the New Testament at that point. I'd been steeped in it for many years during my dissertation, my PhD. And he was making all these arguments that felt more like 21st century Western non-Jewish Christianity and not first century Jewish Christianity. No first century Jew would bat an eye about God annihilating or destroying or causing to suffer forever and ever. The wicked, like, that just doesn't, that wouldn't be an issue, a problem for a first century Jew. And yet he's all about first century Judaism. I was like, man, this is just, come on, man. If

you're going to be Jewish, be Jewish. If you're not going to be Jewish, then that's fine. Then be a modern day Westerner and do that. But don't pretend like you're being a Jewish interpreter or, you know, interpreting the Bible according to its Jewish context. And then when it comes to a doctrine you're not comfortable with, you're going to just lay aside first century Judaism. So I ended up writing a blog or two. It was my first ever blog I've ever written. 2011. I think the title was You Can't Have Your Cake and Eat It Too. I think I might even misspelled the title. Maybe I didn't. I can't remember. But it was basically showing that regardless of what, well, it wasn't regarding, basically showing that Brabill's view is just very un-Jewish. It doesn't, it just basically stiff arms first century Judaism. So fast forwarding a few weeks after I read Love Wins, I talked to Francis Chan.

I'd been at the church where he was pastoring at. He had since left, but we'd still been in, I mean, mild contact. And he reached out and said, hey, I'm getting all these questions about Love Wins. What do you think? And I said, well, it's kind of a big question. Let's schedule a Skype call and let's talk about it. So we scheduled a Skype call. And the day before we Skyped, I went on a long run.

But back then I would run in the hills of Simi Valley. I really missed those long runs. They were so awesome. Go up in the, especially on a really hot day, you go up in the kind of deserted hills up in Simi Valley and I would run for like, well, maybe like an hour or so. And, um, I remember on that run and I would sometimes pray and I remember it wasn't a prayer. It was just more of a thought. I was like, you know what? I think I'm going to try to convince Francis to write a book on responding to

Rob Bell and maybe I can help write it for him. You know, I know he's a busy guy. I know, you know, he has a lot going on. But man, I could write this book in my sleep.

I feel like, because there's just some blatant mistakes that Rob Bell's doing. Anyway, I had this idea of like writing a book or helping Francis write a book or writing a forum or whatever. And so when we Skyped together, you know, we talked a lot about Rob Bell's book and what should we do. And I was like, you know, I said, man, I think you should write a book. He's like, I don't have time to write a whole book. I was like, well, you know, a book, a book as significant as Love Wins deserves a book-length response, not just like a blog responding to it. I mean, I wrote a blog responding to it.

I think 10 people read it. And even if Francis wrote a blog, it was like people would see like, well, you can't really respond to everything in the book in a blog. So long story short, we decided to write a book. And he was adamant that we need to write this together, not just you ghostwriting it for me or whatever. Like you need to write this, you know, we're going to do this together. And the publisher was super excited but said we need to have this book. We need to have the manuscript in eight weeks.

Usually it takes a year, two, three, four years to write a book. They said we need it in eight weeks. I said, okay, I can do this. And we actually finished it in seven weeks. We wrote Erasing Hell in seven weeks, which was insane. Now, when I wrote Erasing Hell, when I say we wrote Erasing Hell, I genuinely wanted to come at this question from an unbiased perspective. God, what does the Bible say about hell? Is he right? Is he wrong? I'm willing to go where the text leads.

And Francis had the same posture. Both of us were like, I don't think he's right. This is what I grew up hearing. And I know the Bible enough to think like, no, I think the Bible talks about hell. I mean, it's not just the horrible things happening in this life. It is actually a place of punishment in the afterlife. And so, but we're like, hey, let's just see what does the Bible actually say? So during my research, you know, I became more and more convinced that hell was an irreversible

place of punishment. That was our main question that we were addressing was, it didn't even have anything to do with annihilation, really. question that we were addressing was, it didn't even have anything to do with annihilation, really. It had to do with, is hell a real place of punishment in the afterlife? Not just like the genocides and abuses in this life. That was kind of what Rob Bell was saying. Like, do I believe in hell? Yeah, I believe in hell. I believe that genocides are horrible and child abuse is horrible and all these things. I'm like, yeah, I believe those things too. But is that what the word hell means in the New Testament? I was like, I don't, I'm not, I'm just not seeing it, Rob. Like I don't,

the Bible doesn't use the term or concept of hell to describe bad things happening in this life. It seems, from every angle I look at it, it seems like the word hell and the concept surrounding it means a place of punishment in the afterlife for those who reject God. So that was our main question we were addressing. Is there a place of punishment called hell in the afterlife that, you know, and is it irreversible? Because Rob does, he does give a nod to hell being an afterlife place of punishment. He does give a nod to that. But then he basically says, like, you know, people can be rescued out of it. It's kind of a classic, a Wesleyan version of Christian

universalism to distinguish it from a more Bardian version of Christian universalism. A Bardian version is much more reformed, much more Calvinistic that says, you know, God is so sovereign that he will overcome the unbelief of people in hell. Whereas a Wesleyan version says, no, God's not going to violate free will. So God will do whatever it takes to make sure people turn to him in the afterlife. But one puts the emphasis on people turning to God. The other puts the emphasis on God overcoming their unbelief and violating their free will to, you know, believe in him. And that's more of a Bardian version, you know,

the more sovereignty version, whereas there's a Western version that says that, no, God's going to do whatever it takes to do whatever it takes to make sure that people turn to him while they're in hell. And that's kind of the brand that Rob Bell seemed to endorse. Now, so that was the biggest question in A Race to Hell. We were not even talking about or concerned too much about whether annihilation or ECT, eternal conscious torment, are, you know, are the most biblical. However, we did have, we, you know, when you're writing a book on hell, you do have to kind of raise the question of, you know, what about annihilation? During my research, I read an essay called The New Testament Doctrine, The New Testament Teaching of Hell by a Southern Baptist New Testament professor

by Earl Ellis is his name. Earl Ellis. He's passed away now, I think. Taught at a Southwestern seminary in Texas for a number of years. He's Southern Baptist. So I was like, okay, here's, you know, obviously a conservative evangelical scholar. And, you know, I just, and I had been reading so much stuff from scholars on the doctor of hell. So I remember reading this essay without even really thinking about just, I kind of read it pretty lazily. So I remember reading this essay without even really thinking about, just, I kind of read it pretty lazily. Like I just kind of like was going through it like, yeah, you know, just want to make sure that I'm on the right track and everything. And towards, and he was just kind of, and my thinking cap wasn't really strapped on. I was just kind of reading it, reading it, reading it. But then I get to the end and he kind of says,

therefore annihilation is correct. I'm like, whoa, what? Hold the phone here, dude. I was like, I remember enjoying his arguments and reading this stuff. Like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Just didn't really think about kind of where he was going. I was like, oh my gosh. So I went back and read it again. I was like, oh my word. I didn't even, I didn't thought about half the things he was arguing for. He basically looked at the language of death and destruction and said, by far the dominant language used to describe the fate of the wicked is language of death and destruction, which given its New Testament sense means the cessation of life. Matthew 10, 28, do not fear those who kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul.

Rather fear him who is able to destroy both body and soul in hell. The word destroy there is used unambiguously in parallel to kill the body and kill the soul. God is able to kill body and soul in hell, end the life of, not keep the body alive, keep the soul, or no, sorry, you know, destroy the body, keep the soul alive or whatever. No, it's like destroy both of them, which means kill in this context. Matthew, or sorry, Romans 6, 23, the wages of sin are death, but the free gift of God is eternal life. Eternal life, living foreverness is contrasted with death. John 3.16, this really blew me away. For God so loved the world that he gave his only son, but that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. There's a contrast between perishing and eternal life.

eternal life. There's a contrast between perishing and eternal life. What does perish mean in its most natural sense? Well, the Greek word apolumi, which, you know, I've been looking up, meant to cease to live, to be destroyed. You're not living anymore. So he pointed out just a pervasive use of death and destruction language to describe the final state of the wicked and therefore concluded that annihilation is the New Testament doctrine. And I remember reading that article the second time. It had a lump in my gut for three reasons. First of all, Ellis seemed right. I was like, how do I? It's just his argument seemed really persuasive.

Another lump in my gut, the second reason is he was pointing to famous verses like John 3.16. Like, wait, how have I never even thought about this? How have I quoted John 3, 16, 879 times in my Christian life and not even thought about the word perish? Shall not perish, but have eternal life. Like how? So my mind was kind of spinning, like what, what just psychologically, what, what, what happened here? Like, how did I not even raise the question? And then my third lump in my gut, lump in my gut for three reasons was, crap, what do we do now? What if he's right? We're contracted to write this book and he's making a really good case, but is this going to go, would this go over well if we argued for annihilation? And so I'm kind of freaking

out. I called Francis and I said, look, man, look, look, I have seen more evidence for annihilation than I had originally thought. What do you think about this? And he's like, man, I never thought about that. And I was starting, you know, I kind of reviewed some of these passages and he's like, oh man, I never thought about that. Gosh, well, I love, this is what I love about Francis. He goes, well, dude, screw evangelicalism. Like we got to go to

the text leads, like whatever, like let's figure this out and go from there. And I said, well, look, here's the thing. Like the main thing I'm seeing in scripture is that hell is irreversible. That's the main thing. Well, whether annihilation or ECT isn't really our main point, but I'm sure it's going to come up in the book. Like let's, we got to be, you know, be honest. He's like, we got to go to the text lead. So I started to dig in a little bit more and think through, um, think through, um, other, you know, I, I had all these, like, what about this? What about that? Like, I had to think through all these passages that I had assumed meant ECT, eternal conscious torment. So for instance, like the classic one, weeping and gnashing of teeth in Matthew 8, 12, 22, 13, and many, and a few other passages where, you know, people will be weeping and gnashing their teeth.

It's like, well, isn't, isn't that talking about eternal conscious torment? I was like, well, I kind of thought through that and did some word studies and stuff. And I saw that if you do a word search, you know, the gnashing of teeth does not mean pain and it doesn't demand that you live forever in hell. It just is a reference to anger, rage, stubborn resistance. Job 16.9, Psalm 33.16, 37.12, Lamentations 2.16, Acts 7.54 and Psalm 112.10. So it doesn't mean pain, and it certainly doesn't mean living forever in pain. That's not what the phrase means. Psalm 112.10, the wicked man will see and be vexed. He will gnash his teeth and waste away. The longings of the wicked will come to nothing. I mean, here you have a clearer combination of gnashing your teeth and anger as you're wasting away,

as you're ceasing to live. You know, there's a funny story, by the way, of how toothless people will face judgment if there will be gnashing of teeth. So Dr. Ian Paisley, a fiery first century preacher and politician, he was preaching one Sunday on the end times and he was preaching on the day of judgment. And as he reached the climax of his sermon, he said that on the day of judgment, there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth. And he was all fired up. And at that point, an old woman raised her hand and said, Dr. Paisley, I have no teeth. And Dr. Paisley said, Madam, teeth will be provided.

Because how are you going to gnash your teeth if you don't have any teeth he said we're going to be given teeth so we can gnash them as we waste away forever and ever and ever in eternal conscious torment the phrase weeping and gnashing of teeth does not at all support eternal conscious torment it doesn't support annihilation either it's just almost irrelevant. It's not the point. It's not talking about how long people will be in hell for. It's talking about their remorse, their regret, and their anger. Basically, it's kind of like the C.S. Lewis, the door is locked on the inside. They will go to judgment holding on to the resistance is kind of the point. holding onto the resistance is kind of the point. What about unquenchable fire? Matthew 3.12, Mark 9.48, Matthew 3.12, his winnowing fork is in his hand and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.

I did a quick word study on that and found that unquenchable fire is stock Old Testament imagery for a fire that destroys everything in its path. Isaiah 1, 31, 34, 10 to 11, Jeremiah 4, 4, Jeremiah 7, 17, 27, and on and on and on and on. This is pretty stock Old Testament imagery. That unquenchable highlights the comprehensiveness and finality of the destruction of the fire,

not its ability to eternally torture the thing forever and ever and ever. In fact, Isaiah 66.24, the dead bodies are consumed by fire. It doesn't mean that therefore they are being tortured or living forever. They're dead bodies. Like it's just, they're dead. They're not alive. So unquenchable simply means it's such a powerful fire that it can't be put out. But again, it doesn't mean it lasts.

It doesn't even mean the fire lasts forever. I'm sorry. I'm talking faster than my mind's going. It doesn't mean the fire will never go out. It just means it's so strong that it can't be put out. You see the difference? I mean, a fireman might not be able to quench a fire that's burning down a house. They may be spraying it and spraying it, but it's so powerful,

so comprehensive that they can't put it out. It's unquenchable. It doesn't mean the fire is going to last forever and ever. It just means it's, it's just emphasizing its, its power, its comprehensiveness, its finality. Um, what about everlasting fire? And this is again, me kind of going through different, um, what about this? What about that, again, me kind of going through different, what about this? What about that? As I was kind of wrestling with annihilation. Matthew 18, 8, 25, 41, and Jude 7, the three times in Scripture that everlasting or eternal fire is used. Well, you may know that the word eternal, ionios, sometimes translated eternal or everlasting, it could refer to a period of time

or it could refer to never-ending time. The Hebrew olam, the parallel, can be used of just a period of time. Jonah was in the belly of the fish for olam, three days, okay? It wasn't eternity. And even Rob Bell points this out. I remember when Rob Bell pointed it out, I was like, you know what, you're kind of right. Like Ionios, eternal, or Olam, you know, it's a really flexible word. It can mean various things. And in the New Testament, Ionios, the adjective does often mean everlasting, like never-ending time, but it could

also refer to the quality of something. Something could have the quality of the next life or the quality of the age to come. It doesn't have to mean never ending time. So what about when it's modifying the fire? Well, just linguistically, it could mean that, you know, Ionios refers to a period of time that the fire is going. It could mean never ending. The fire goes on forever and ever and ever and never ever stops burning. It could also mean that the fire has the quality of the age to come. So then I did a quick word study on eternal fire. Is there any place else in like first century or, you know, second temple Judaism where we see the phrase eternal fire? Well, let's

be, I guess, let's back up and begin with Jude 7. Jude 7 says that Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, okay, this is referring back to Genesis 18 and 19, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued strange flesh serve as an example by, by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire. Wait a minute. I've been to Sodom and Gomorrah. We're not sure exactly where the cities were,

but probably on the south end of the Dead Sea out in the desert. And there's no fire there today. So whatever eternal fire means, I mean, here it's referring to that incident when God rained down fire on Sodom and Gomorrah and punished the city. It's a reference to that historical event. It's not talking about the afterlife. It's talking about what God did to Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 18 and 19. Genesis 19. Wait a minute. So it's called an eternal fire there. So by definition, it's not talking about a fire that lasts forever because it doesn't last forever. Either there's a contradiction in Genesis 19 because I've been there because it doesn't last forever. Either there's a

contradiction in Genesis 19 because I've been there and it's not still going, the fire's not still burning, or eternal means something else that is very much within the purview of what the word could mean. Maybe it means the quality of the fire. It was so intense, so comprehensive, so irreversible, so divine that it's eternal or Ionios. That seemed to be the plain sense in Jude 7. But if you look at other texts, there's three other, I found three other references in the Jewish context of the New Testament where eternal fire is used in a book called the Testament of Zebulun in the

so-called Testament, the Testament of the 12 patriarchs. It's a first century work right on time in the New Testament. There's a reference in a book called the Testament of Zebulun. But upon the ungodly shall the Lord bring eternal fire and destroy them throughout all generations. So here eternal fire is paired with destruction. Finality. In 1QS 2.8, this is the Qumran rule, the community rule.

That's what 1QS means. It's a document from the Dead Sea Scrolls written prior to the New Testament, about 100 years. In column 2, line 8 of that document, of that scroll, it says that the wicked will be assigned to the gloom of everlasting fire. Same phrase. In the same context, the same context talks about God bringing destruction upon the wicked. I mean, if you read 1QS2, it's very clear from the context that it's talking more about

annihilation, destruction, not ongoing torment. 4 Maccabees 12.12, this comes from the first century, late first century, justice has been laid up for you, intense and eternal fire and tortures, and these throughout all time will never let you go. So here in 4 Maccabees 12, we have a clear reference to eternal fire, meaning a fire that will torture people forever and ever. Okay, so this would very much support ECT. However, we know that from the context, not from the phrase alone. The phrase alone, eternal fire, doesn't convey that. It's that it's been joined with the phrase tortures throughout all time, which will never let you go. So the context explicitly says something like ECT,

but the phrase itself doesn't mean that. And again, in the other two Jewish references, the phrase certainly doesn't mean everlasting punishment, a punishment that will go on forever and ever and ever and ever. And again, the references in the New Testament, especially Jude 7, does not mean that. So all that to say, here I am, you know, looking at the doctrine of hell and pulling out all these phrases and assumptions I had about what hell means, has to mean, can mean, and I am kind of thrown into a tailspin. Even the term hell itself, if you do a word study on Gehenna, you realize that Gehenna comes from Jeremiah 7, 32 to 33, which says that the days are coming when it will no longer be called Topheth or the valley of the son of Hinnom. That's where

we get Gehenna means the son of Hinnom, but that valley will be called the valley of slaughter for they will bury in Topheth because there is no room elsewhere. And the dead bodies of this people will be food for the birds of the air and for the beasts of the earth and none will frighten them away. This is the undisputed background of the term Gehenna, translated hell 12 or 13 times in the New Testament. And it speaks unambiguously of a slaughter, not an ongoing torment of the wicked in Jeremiah 7, 32 to 33. So there's nothing in the word itself. There's nothing in the word Gehenna itself that

demands eternal conscious torment. Now, of course, when Gehenna is used throughout early Judaism, sometimes it can be used to refer to eternal conscious torment. Sometimes it refers to annihilation. Sometimes it actually refers to ultimate reconciliation or universalism. Sometimes it combines both. Sometimes it's unclear. And I have references here. If you're interested in the Jewish references of Gehenna, you can let me know. That the word itself doesn't mean anything other than God's going to judge the wicked.

In terms of the duration of what that looks like, the word itself doesn't mean, there's nothing intrinsic to the word Gehenna or hell itself that means never ending conscious torment. That's, again, that's just responsible, doing a responsible word study that the context is what must be, the context determines the nature of hell that Gehenna is referring to. And again, if you go back to its original context, it clearly refers to something that would be much more akin to annihilation, where those who are Gehenna'd, those who are cast into Gehenna will lose their life. They're not sitting there being tortured forever and ever and ever. So let me go back. So this is, this is, this is what I'm wrestling with as I'm, as I'm, um, uh, wrestling with the doctrine of hell in my writing and research for erasing the book, erasing hell. Um, you know, annihilation was not

the main point of the book. Eternal conscious torment was not the main point of the book. The main point of the book was, is hell irreversible? Well, actually, is there a place called hell that where people will be thrown? And is it reversible? Like you can get out of hell or is it irreversible? You can't get out of hell. So we concluded, and we only spent like two and a half pages on annihilation versus ECT, which some people don't realize that. When they hear that I believe in annihilation, they're like, oh, so you don't believe in what you wrote in Erasing Hell? I'm like, well, I believe in about 98.5% of what I wrote in Erasing Hell. The only part I might disagree with now is the two and a half pages that we leaned heavily towards eternal conscious torment.

And this is what we said. The debate about hell's duration is much more complex than I had first assumed. While I lean heavily on the side of that says it's everlasting, I'm not ready to claim this with a complete certainty. Even that was a little stronger than I think I felt at that time, but I can live with it. So why did we lean towards ECT when we wrote Race in Hell? words ECT, when we wrote Race in Hell. There are three main passages that we leaned on. Matthew 25, 46, Revelation 14, 9 through 11, and Revelation chapter 20, verses 10 and verses 15. It's really verse 15. Well, yeah, verse 15 as it correlates with verse 10. So I'll let you look those up. I'll just read one of these. Matthew 25, 46 says, and these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into everlasting life. And here, you know,

if you look at the verse, it seems like, well, goodness, we know that life is everlasting and it's contrasted with punishment. So the punishment must be everlasting. And then Revelation 14, 11 seemed like a kind of a slam dunk for me. And Revelation 20 was a bit more fuzzy, but still seemed to support eternal conscious torment. So because, I mean, because of those verses, but also just the weight of tradition too. It's like, we've been studying this for a few weeks and I could see it's a lot more complicated than I had thought. Saw a lot more evidence for annihilation than I thought ever existed. But I was also very sensitive to and respectful of the weight of Christian tradition. Am I going to spend a few weeks and overturn a huge weight of Christian tradition? That seems a little arrogant. And

there was some verses that definitely seemed to support ECT. That's where we were in 2011 when we wrote Erasing Hell. So that was what went into the book. Again, I can't emphasize enough, the whole point of Erasing Hell was not to argue eternal conscious torment over annihilation or universalism. It was precisely to argue that two things, that there was a place of punishment called hell. It's not just a metaphor for all the horrible things in this life. And number two, that that place of punishment in the afterlife called hell is irreversible.

If you go there, once you go there, you cannot come out of there. Since then, since 2011, I mean, I took a break from studying hell, but ended up revisiting the question throughout the last, what is that? Seven, eight years. I've been revisiting the doctrine of hell. One of the early times I revisited it was around the time I had a podcast interview with Chris Around the time I had a podcast interview with Chris Date. Some of you might know Chris Date. Chris helps run, I think he founded it with some of his friends, but he helps run the Rethinking Hell website.

More than a website, it's more like a movement. I mean, they have podcasts, interviews, conferences, papers, and blogs, and tons of stuff. So if you're at all interested in this conversation and you are, man, if you're saying like, man, I'm really intrigued by this annihilation perspective, Rethinking Hell is kind of a one-stop shop website that answers pretty much every question you can possibly have about eternal conscious torment versus annihilation. And they do some work on why they don't hold to universalism. But I remember doing a podcast with Chris Date. And at the time, Chris Date was not theologically trained. He was a computer program software engineer,

a computer programmer. I don't know what he, I don't know that world. So I probably butchering his whatever. But so I remember he was like, hey, I would love to have you on a podcast. I was like, ah, sure, whatever, you know. And he kind of smoked me exegetically. He was throwing out and he was so gracious. He really was. But he's incredibly smart and very

well read on this topic. And I didn't even know, I didn't know who he was. I was like, yeah, sure, whatever, do a podcast. And I had done a lot of podcasts and interviews in the wake of Erasing Hell because Francis wasn't really into doing any of that. So he threw them all my way. So I didn't need to get prepared or anything. I was like, yeah, sure. I know what I believe, whatever. But he was pushing me. Not pushing me, but just throwing out like, what about this?

What about that? What about that? What about this? And I was like, I don't know. I'm not sure. Hmm, I'll have to think about that. Hmm, not really sure. And I was like, wait a minute.

I'm getting spanked exegetically by a guy who doesn't even have any theological training. I'm like, maybe I need to really revisit this topic. So long story short, over the last eight years, I revisited specifically the biblical evidence for or against the annihilation view of hell, or some call it conditional immortality. And let me say this, I'm going to say this, and if you don't agree, it's totally fine. Now, this is my journey, okay? It's one of the beauties of postmodernism is you can't disagree with my journey. So, having examined the biblical evidence for and against the annihilation view of hell as fairly as I can, as thoroughly as I can, I became overwhelmingly convinced that the annihilation view of hell is not only much more biblical than eternal conscious torment, but it is among the most clearest doctrines I have ever personally, personally examined in scripture.

That sounds bold, sounds overstated. Maybe you will drop your support after hearing that. And that's, I guess it's fine. I mean, would not want you to do that, but I'm just giving you my personal journey and the exegetical biblical evidence for and against annihilation and for and against eternal conscious torment. And I have found the biblical evidence to be overwhelmingly in favor of annihilation. So, you know what? This introduction has gone way, way, way longer than I thought. I was hoping to sum up just kind of the background leading up to why I hold to annihilation today. And I've,

this has kind of come out in several podcasts over the last few years. So, you know, I've given bits and pieces. I don't think I've ever given kind of an A to Z sweep of why I hold to annihilation. So I do want to do that, but it's been 40 minutes and I hope this doesn't cramp your style. Is that a phrase anymore? Is that from the 90s? I want to put a pause on this discussion right now. I want to close out this podcast.

And in the next Patreon-only podcast, I will conclude this conversation, why I hold to an annihilation view of hell. I want to look at the Old Testament first. I want to look at what the Old Testament has to say about the fate of the wicked. Then I want to look at some branches of early Judaism, specifically the Psalms of Solomon and the Dead Sea Scrolls, if that means anything to you. We'll look at a couple branches of Judaism between the Testaments. Then we will look at the New Testament, and I will try to show that the Annihilation view of hell is taught with remarkable consistency throughout the entire Bible. And then I want to return to some of these, the big three passages and show

why the Annihilation reading is still superior, even in light of those three passages that you used to throw me for a loop. So we'll close out there. Thanks for listening to the March edition of the Patreon Only podcast for those supporting the show at $25 a month. Thanks so much for your support. And we will see you next time on this episode where we revisit the question of the annihilation view of hell. Thank you.